Don‘t Knock the Boat: Feminine Characters in Conrad‘s “Heart of Darkness”

Abstract

Kelly Larkin Conway‘s “Don‘t Knock the Boat: Feminine Characters in Conrad‘s ‘Heart of Darkness‘” floats the argument that critics have ignored a key feminine character in the story: The Boat. Indeed, “The Nellie” is the only female character to be christened with a name in Conrad‘s work. Larkin Conway suggests that the Nellie may be unmoored from traditional criticism of femininity in “Heart of Darkness” since it “resists both the expectation of spatial confinement, by transgressing national and cultural boundaries, and stereotypes of fragility” of women in travel writing. Larkin Conway‘s work is buoyed by the critical work of Karen Lawrence, who notes in Penelope Voyages: Women and Travel in the British Literary Tradition that “enduring narratives of the gendering of travel, a narrative that conflates travel and absence in the experience of Penelope, who is left behind” persist in the Western imagination (ix). Larkin Conway shows, however, that we may read the Nellie as the only female character who transgresses traditional gendered roles and “creates the opportunity for a dynamic feminine character” in Conrad‘s story. Larkin Conway does not turn a blind eye to the problematic representations of other women in the novel, but she does suggest Conrad may not always toe the line when it comes to Victorian feminine stereotypes.

Dr. Matt Huculak